I've got an appointment at the dentist this afternoon - at 2:30! 
Happy invoicing!
- Bad Faith at Second Mesa - ”After swiping sacred American Indian artifacts three archeology thieves believe they are being hunted down by spirits of vengeance.” A cautionary tale for those who mess with the Hopi
- Inside the Proton, the ‘Most Complicated Thing You Could Possibly Imagine’ - ”The positively charged particle at the heart of the atom is an object of unspeakable complexity, one that changes its appearance depending on how it is probed. We’ve attempted to connect the proton’s many faces to form the most complete picture yet.” There'll be a test at the end of time.
- Ancient Tree Rings Shed Light On Mysterious Once-Every-1,000 Years Radiation Storms - HT to Doctor Strangelove for this handy warning of the doom to come: ”Mysterious Miyake events involve sudden surges in the amount of atmospheric carbon-14, but a study exploring their origins raises more questions than answers.”
- Digital Giza - A collection of virtual reality tours of the various monuments at Giza: ”The Giza Project is a non-profit international initiative based at Harvard University… Digital Giza, is the Project's online digital repository of all archaeological documentation from multiple institutions, presented free to all, alongside Giza 3D, a virtual environment based on some of that documentation.”
- Apples & People - This week's niche area of expertise: ”Apples & People explores the astonishing story of the apple, connecting its diverse history to humanity and culture. Based upon a specially commissioned global map of the apple which traces a network of stories from the ancient world to the present day, this online programme and associated social media reveals just how significant and iconic this humble fruit has become.”
- Designing a high-resolution, LEGO-based microscope for an educational setting - Something useful to do with all those plastic bricks: ”In this article we present the construction of a microscope using LEGO® bricks and low-cost, easily available lenses. We demonstrate that the obtained magnification and resolution are sufficient to resolve micrometer-sized objects and propose a series of experiments that explore various biophysical principles. Finally, a study with students in the age range of 9 to 13 shows that the understanding of microscopy increases significantly after working with the LEGO microscope.”
- Rod McKuen Was the Bestselling Poet in American History. What Happened? - The story of a now-forgotten cultural phenomenon: ”n On April 29, 1969, Carnegie Hall was sold out. The artist who filled the fabled performance hall wasn’t a symphony orchestra, or a Broadway belter, or a jazz star. It wasn’t a rock band or a folk singer or any hero of the counterculture taking the stage just a few months before Woodstock. On that night, more than 3,000 fans filled the Main Hall on 57th Street to see a placid blond man wearing a sweatshirt and sneakers. He stood before a microphone on his 36th birthday and performed a poem about a lost cat named Sloopy.” See also What to Make of Rod McKuen? from the Neglected Books blog.
- The Enduring Urban Mystery of the Toynbee Tiles - ”Imagine literally stumbling across a colorful tile in the road with some version of the bizarre inscription “Toynbee idea in movie 2001 resurrect dead on planet Jupiter.” This seemingly incomprehensible mambo-jumbo has flummoxed lovers of urban legends for decades, since they first started appearing in the late 1980s… Today, there are hundreds of these tiles, which are recorded on the website Toynbeeidea.com. Neither the meaning, nor the creator has ever been identified, though many theories have proliferated.”
- The unusual bootstrap drivers inside the 8086 microprocessor chip - Ken Shirriff is back with a mysterious bit of circuitry: ”The 8086 microprocessor is one of the most important chips ever created; it started the x86 architecture that still dominates desktop and server computing today. I've been reverse-engineering its circuitry by studying its silicon die. One of the most unusual circuits I found is a "bootstrap driver", a way to boost internal signals to improve performance. This circuit consists of just three NMOS transistors, amplifying an input signal to produce an output signal, but it doesn't resemble typical NMOS logic circuits and puzzled me for a long time.”
- カセットテープ収蔵品展示館 - which means “Cassette tape collection exhibition hall”
Happy invoicing!
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